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Tuesday, July 8, 2014

Washington Fourth Festivities

The fourth of July in Washington is impressive. Coming from a town where fireworks were only recently legalized, these people are practically card-carrying pyromaniacs. In an attempt to fit in, we forwent the grocery store stands and instead headed to Firecracker Alley, a carnival set-up of stands on the reservation in Tacoma. When we pulled up, people all around us were filling their trunks with boxes upon boxes of fireworks. Teenagers played catch with a football in between the stalls. Kids chased each other around in primary-colored bouncy castles. It was a party.

Bargaining is neither of our strong suits, so we were reeled in with the old sales trick of, "Well, how much are you willing to spend?" We probably could have gotten a little more for our money, but overall, we came away with more than we could have in town. The third of July was spent setting off bottle rockets and firecrackers, rolling an orange smoke bomb in while our friend was in the outdoor shower, and shooting off fountains whose red, green, and white sparks made us lip trumpet and laugh to "The Mexican Hat Dance" every time. That night, the neighbor gave a pre-show with several boxes of mortars.

The next night, we shot off Roman candles and got a taste of what it would be like to be wizards.

"Just ignore that label..."

The neighbor's show did not disappoint. A crew of four people in headlamps lit the boxes of mortars off from their dock and another group lit even more from on top of the hill, creating a non-stop stream of light and color, usually with at least three or five going off at any given time right above our heads. From sundown to just past midnight, the whole edge of the bay was lined with people setting off their fireworks.

My brother-in-law and his girlfriend set off mortars from our dock and watched the show from kayaks.